The character that is the combination of an exclamation point and a question mark is called an 'interobang.' 

Why haven't I been writing? Because I'm publishing two books, which are now on sale, applying to a graduate program in creative writing at University College, Dublin, packing and preparing to move to New Zealand for six months, and selling off all my belongings. What have YOU been doing with YOUR life, hotshot? 

Oh, wow, you had a baby? That's amazing. 
Oh, gee, look at that little person. Hi there, you. Aren't you something. Jesus, he really looks exactly like the both of you at the same time. How is that possible? Hi, guy. You're beautiful. Hi! Yeah, you! Oops, you threw up. Well, that happens. 
Hey, great work, you two. Really. Wow. Congratulations. 

Anyway, what the hell have the REST of you been doing that's so fuckin-
christ, you had a baby too? What the hell is this? What was going on nine months ago? 
Oh, yeah. I remember that. I got drunk and went for a walk in the woods. 
Yeah, no, you guys just had a bunch of sex. I figured. I mean, I figured you did it at least once. Yeah. Makes sense. 

Yeah, so what have the REST of you-
You're getting married? 

Eh, unimpressed. 

BOOKS ARE OOOOOUT! 

What do you think is happening in Lake Woebegone now that Garrison Keillor has packed it in and gone back to his home planet? I'd like to think that without Keillor's folksy wisdom to keep them in check, those above-average children are going to invent doomsday weapons and overthrow their strong mothers and good looking fathers, and Lake Woebegone will become something like Ender's Game meets Children of the Corn. 

That, or it'll be an epic showdown between technologically superior, heavily-armed above average children and hulking, nigh-unstoppable strong mothers, with the good-looking fathers as the damsel-in-distress figure threatened in the middle. Rugged, capable midwestern farmers in tight, dirty Levis and ripped flannels, their dairy-fed muscular torsos heaving as they try to get enough wind to continue screaming as their irradiated powerhouse of a wife rends steel and titanium asunder in an attempt to get inside the mechanized powersuit designed and worn by her misbehaving above-average eight year old. 

I suppose there were probably strong women and good looking men in Woebegone who weren't parents, but if I had to guess, they left town as soon as the first quiet, nerdy little boy with a polish surname and an irritating precocious affect came lumbering out of the garage in a fifteen foot tall ambulatory tank powered by extraterrestrial elements. I mean, I would. 


Been building the books nonstop the last week or so, and I think I'm finally ready to bust down an agent's door and hold them at squirrel-point until they agree to take over my book-building and publicity responsibilities. Jayzuz, I hate this shit. I mean, I don't hate it totally, but I definitely want to get rolling on the next book, which is in the planning stages and needs another seven or fifty hours of stoned-out brainstorming barnstorm work. I just sent in a proof order for the Origami Man reissue, so that's that. I think I get to do some of my chosen creative crap later on this afternoon. Holly looyah. 

Covers are looking amazing. First one is done, I just plopped it across the Origami Man page. Tom McGrath does some amazing work, I must say. Check him out here, he's really something. 

Saw the debate last night. I have a working holiday visa for New Zealand, I have a fresh passport and some money, and Diane is running around in those hills with my kidney, so I suppose now is as good a time as it'll ever be for me to hit the far side of the planet for a while. I'm excited for a change, I just wish that I didn't feel increasingly like there this country is nipping at my heels, trying to get me to leave. It was cute when I got my new passport in less than a week. It stopped being cute when I watched Trump in the first debate, and it turned into something like a microwaved suppurating guinea pig when I saw him last night. Motherfucker needs to get darted in the neck by animal control. 

To paraphrase a quote from the great Jack Nicholson, "This [country] needs an enema!"
​

​

You should piss on your neighbor's lawn. 
You should stand in the shadow presented by the opposing streetlights, where you won't be seen
and pee on the base of his trees. 
Or hers. 
It doesn't matter. 
What matters is being able to do the tiny bad things. 
You should do the bad things
as long as they don't directly impact another person's life. 
DO the thing. 
Fuck as hard as both of you want. 
Take ecstasy and go to a Neil Labute play.
Piss on your neighbor's lawn. 
Do the bad things. 
​Life is

The trivia link is up. There's nothing there, but there is a delightful picture of Ham the Chimp, the first ape to be launched into orbit. I like the picture, because it speaks volumes of the intelligence of animals. Ham definitely knows something big is about to happen. And he definitely has misgivings about it. In fact Ham is definitely considering hopping out of that space-chimp-container and hightailing it for the nearest bar. But there's always the possibility that Earth will explode while he's in orbit, and that he will ride the shockwave to a new planet where the sunlight gives Ham powers far beyond those of normal chimps. It's not a likely scenario. But he's willing to take the risk. 

​

There are some non-functioning links on the navigation bar. This isn't an accident. This is by design. You haven't unlocked those pages yet. You need the Star Key. Try looking in the dungeons below. But beware! There are monsters lurking in the depths......

You ever open up your website and there's like, more cobwebs than not cobwebs? And then you inhale some of the cobwebs when you're groping for the light switch, and you start coughing and a lot more cobwebs fall on you and you wonder all of a sudden if 'cobweb spiders' are a thing, and then you fall on you ass and you're covered in cobwebs and you realize none of this actually happened, because web sites are just digital images on a screen, and however terrifying they might be, cobweb spiders can't live inside a flat screen? 
But if you're reading this on an old school CRT monitor, watch out. Cobweb spiders. 

Been editing my ass off lately. That's a clever way to tell you that bikini season is coming, and I've been hitting the squats hard. 
Wait, no, I'm talking about writing. I've been editing the book. Still on track to release the sequel sometime in the next several months, although given that advertising is a thing I have to do, I may delay the release in order to foster interest. Foment? Fricassee. I need to fricassee interest in my book. 

But I am editing. And the editing goes well. I just haven't been on my hustle, lately. Jay-Z would be disappointed in me. He might even say I've been knocking the hustle, even though presumably you can't do that. He might, however, tempter his disapproval with some recognition of my grind. Been grinding on this book like Beyonce grinds...the heads of screws down when she's refinishing her deck. She's got kids running barefoot, nobody wants their foot cut open on a rusty screw. Nobody is putting a ring on that. 

​This is the view from where I am:

This is where I live, now. This desk. Typical day is wake up, edit until I start having fantasies about running away and joining the Marine's Circus (they have SEALs) go to the gym to remind myself I live in a world populated by people who aren't just extensions of myself, then go to work and make those people drinks. Rinse, repeat. 

It's not surprising to me that I chose to do this. What surprises me is the degree to which I am compelled to do this. If I had done anything else, if I were a lawyer, or a sanitation worker, or a professional killer, I would still be telling myself stories in my head. I'm still doing it, even as I work on The Adventures of Gregory Samson, Space Explorer. I'm coming up with other stories, writing them down, putting them aside for later, like a squirrel hoarding nuts that fall out of his ears. 

That would be one confused, happy squirrel. I suppose that's me. A happy person, confused at their luck. 

I'll update this when I have more to say. In the meantime, my idiot twitter feed and utterly narcissistic Instagram feed will most likely remain idiotic and narcissistic, respectively, and sporadically amusing. 

Hemingway never had to run his own god damn twitter feed. 

So I've just finished reading through A Farther Orbit, the sequel to The Origami Man, and let me tell you, it's 

Heh-HEY there, America, and thanks for stopping by for another edition of Ben Needed Something For His Blog Trivia! I'm your host, the interchangeable Id, Ego and Super-Ego of Benjamin Mumford-Zisk, here to tell you that tree pollen is the number on killer of Americans under ninety-nine, so don't forget to spay and neuter your houseplants! 

1.1

1. The average cumulus cloud weighs how much, fifty pounds, one thousand pounds, a hundred thousand pounds, or more than a million pounds?
2. Which group bites more people every year, sharks or New Yorkers?
3. What famous European chocolate spreadable was invented during WWII by a hazelnut-rich Italian gentleman looking to extend his chocolate ration?
4. What famous elf-driven Nintendo game with a misleading title made its debut on this day in 1986, making it thirty years old and far more successful at that age than I am WHAT AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE?
5. What common farm animal, which shares its name with a Black Sabbath song, was employed by alexander the great to frighten his enemies’ War Elephants? 

I have this team that shows up a lot of Sundays who call themselves them Muffdivers. They sit in the corner and yell "Muff Die VERS!" every chance they get. They get a lot of chances, cause they're like twenty-one and go to college, so they're used to going after every opening they see. I also pause a lot. I think they might be scared of silence. They're great. 

1.2

1. Which two objects in the sky appear to be the same size due to the smaller object being both four hundred times smaller in diameter and four hundred times closer to the earth, approximately? You need to get them both for credit, BEE TEE DUBS. Round one, kids.
2. Mattel once tried to sue the band Aqua over what song?
3. St Patrick’s Day is known as a day of excess today given the holiday’s origins as a feast day on which worshipers could, for one day, ignore the restrictions leveled on them by which Catholic religious observance? Another way of getting this answer would be to turn to a catholic and ask them, what the hell are you doing for god, these days?
4. What mythical creature remains the national animal of Scotland, in spite of the fact that it is 2016? Your hint is that because Scotland is not a virgin, the nation will never be able to attract one of these things.
5. What does Jordan Peele, of Key and Peele, have in common with Jennifer Love Hewitt, star of The Ghost Whisperer and a lot of other things that were not The Ghost Whisperer? 

2.1

1. For one point apiece, name both of Harper Lee’s famous novels, one of which is an American classic and the other of which is a rehash that dismantles the victories of an American classic?
2. I Love You Porgy was the first hit for which famous American chanteuse?
3. What shimmering craft supply, also known as ‘craft herpes,’ is in fact so unique thanks to its manufacturing processes that it can and has been used as forensic evidence in court cases?
4. There are at least one point six million of which of the following for every human being on Earth: Ants, Chopsticks, or old AOL CDs?
5. What is the name of the American magazine, published by Conde Nast, specializing in long form reportage and literature, whose first issue hit the stands this week in 1925? 

Hey, we're gonna do our super secret bonus round! All these questions fit a theme, and if you can tell me what the theme is, I'll give you five extra points! Well, I won't give them to you, I'm not scoring this and I'm actually a figment of your imagination! 

I'm not wearing underwear. 
I don't have a body. 
Boo!
2.2 SUPER SECRET BONUS ROUND

1. Bill Watterson is the creator of what beloved comic strip, which follows the adventures of a little blond boy and his hyperactive imagination?
2. Tyler Durden and the Narrator are the protagonists of what oft quoted novel and movie?
3. The giant terrible rabbit that follows Donnie Darko has been called a horror-movie homage to this 1950 Jimmy Stewart movie, in which a loveable alcoholic claims that he has made friends with an invisible, six foot bow-tie wearing rabbit?
4. Who is Big Bird’s best friend on Sesame Street?
5. Maurice Sendak is the author of what beloved children’s novel?
6. BONUS THEME IS? (5 points)

Didja GET IT? 
Man, I didn't. I never do. And they won't give me the answers until after the commercials, cause ONE TIME I made a few bets. Never gonna let me forget that, ARE ya, Ernie? No, I'm not gonna let it go, my goddam knee pops every time I sit down!
Because they broke it!
Because I couldn't pay the vig, ERNIE. 

Anway. 
3.1

1. What does the Japanese  word Kamikaze translate to in English?
2. What is the name of the current Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church? Your hint is that he’s been all over the news for his wild exploits with the ah, the Pope. Papparazzi has been all OVER them at the clubs.
3. Sam Peckinpah is best known as a director of what genre of movie? It’s not porn.
4. What does NASCAR stand for?
5. What is the name of the 1948 breeding contest that resulted in the breed of chicken that we all know, love, and eat the shit out of to an obscene degree? Was it Chickfest ’48, The Chicken of Tomorrow, or Fowler’s Best in Breed Poultry Convention?

 You know, eat the shit out of is a really terrible phrase. Who came up with that? It was Pamela, wasn't it? 
Bill? I thought he was a Mormon? 
They can lapse? 
Huh. Learn something new every day. 

3.2

1. According to the company’s Chief Marketing Officer, in the mid-nineties about half of the CDs produced in the world had which company’s logo on them?
2. The Prague Cemetary, the Name of the Rose and The Island of the day before are all books by this Italian novelist, who died this past week at the age of 84.  Your hint is if you’ve heard of any 84 year old Italian novelists who died this past week, it was probably this one.
3. Danny Devito’s first job was as a hairdresser for what group of people who never need a hairdresser more than once?
4. Elizabeth Blackwell was the first American Woman to attend what kind of school? She was admitted as a joke in 1847 and then graduated in 1849 and opened her own practice.
5. And finally, for a whopping FIFTEEN POINTS if you know your shit…For one point apiece…name all of Chuck Palahniuk’s novels. 

All right, folks, I'm betting there's a lot of one and two point responses to that last one, we'll be back with answers, after this!
Where's my cigarettes? 
Yeah, I did quit, there's a key bump in there. 
It's been a long year, Ern. 
Well, Marsha left, and I think she wants a divorce, I dunno, I'm having panic attacks every–


"Well, no, I just don't think we can trust someone like her in the White House." 
"She was Secretary of State, dad. And I mean, even if you don't like her, what about Bernie-"
"Oh, don't talk to me about that socialist. I mean, I haven't made up my MIND to vote for Trump, but..."
Does this happen to you? Do you find your family holidays ruined by off-the-rails conservative elements in your family? Are you tired of mentally compensating for loved ones who veil racist, misogynistic or culturally suicidal sentiments behind vaguely-articulated political dogma? Then PrickOff is for you! 
Prickoff is a medical-grade corrosive substance bound up in a viscous antiseptic and anesthetic solution that can be swabbed on to the unevolved members of your family to quickly and painlessly burn them away. PrickOff works in minutes, and cleans up with water!
So next time Gramma starts talking about the Thugs in the White House, or Uncle Frank tells you he supports Donald Trump's plan to bomb Agraba, don't nod and smile and add to your ulcer! Reach for the PrickOff, and Make America Great again!
PrickOff. Remember, there's a chance that gold-mopped psychopath could win, so the more of these morons we keep from voting, the better. 

​


 

BLOG BLOG BLOG BLOG
Listen a dude can only stand so many goddam hours driving a keyboard a day, so I'm gonna keep this brief.

HI THERE NEWCOMERS! 
I'm hard at work and hard at work on the sequel to The Origami Man. It's called A Farther Orbit, and it's all the weird stuff Samson gets into after he bugs out of Earth to keep the bugs off Earth. There's murder and mayhem and a hell of a lot more fun alien nonsense, along with a lot of grownup themes. 

That's my way of saying there's a lot of swearing, a complex plot interwoven with themes of loss, acceptance, and understanding of a person's responsibilities in life, and also a thorough discussion of Cab's potential as a sex toy. 

Anyway, I'm reading it through ahead of the final round of edits, and I'm hoping to have it on the stands by April 25, when I turn 30! 

This is because if I don't have a second book published by my thirtieth birthday I lose my birthright to Mumford-Zisk Manor, and the title shall go to my half-brother, Percival. He's a furry, and I won't have him yiffing around Mother's rose garden. 

Anyway, keep an eye on my twitter and instagram and all that horseshit, because a good friend of mine just told me that I needed to learn to whore myself better. 

What's that? 
No, I'm positive she said 'whore yourself.'
Hustle? I'm supposed to hustle myself? 
That doesn't sound anything like 'whore yourself!' 
Well I don't know where I got 'whore yourself,' Gerald. 
Oh, go shove your Freudian slip up your ass. 
Christ. Take it from 'anyway.'
 
Anyway, keep an eye on my twitter (@mumfordzisk) and instagram (also @mumfordzisk) and my tumblr (hentaibdsmarchive@tumblr.com) for updates on A Farther Orbit and all the rest of The Adventures of Gregory Samson, Space Explorer!

What? 
Oh, fuck off we're live. 
We're really live? 
God damn it Gerald. 

Trivia time is back! 
Last night's game featured both the only super secret bonus theme that no one has ever guessed, and the only time I've gotten applause for an answer no one knew. The answers in round 2.2 all fit a theme...can you tell me what it is?

1.1

1. Kicking things off with some vitriol and kick-drum, Sigh No More, Babel and Wilder mind are the asinine titles of this stupid fucking dogshit neofolk band.
2. What science-fiction friendly brand of stainless-steel American automobile will resume production next month for the first time in more than thirty years?
3. What did Donald Trump host in lieu of attending the GOP debate the other day? Which day? Who gives a shit?
4. So apparently Michael Jackson made it clear before he died that he didn’t want to be played by a white actor, in spite of all the jokes. Moving ahead a few years, what is the name of the white actor that will portray MJ in an upcoming British TV movie?
5. Which three letter agency shared a series of documents on the internet this past week, dubbing them X-files?

ANSWERS
 
1.2

1. Which of the presidential candidates has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame?
2. Which New York State city is known as the City of Light?
3. This GOP candidate was portrayed on SNL saying ‘Doctors say that I have a very punch-able face.’
4. Where has Flint, Michigan been getting its tainted water for the last two years?
5. What was the first animal humans domesticated? The answer might surprise you.

ANSWERS
SCORES
BONUS
 
2.1

1. Who were the two lead singers in NSync? This is your yearly reminder that boybands, however appalling in their own right, still adhere to certain traditional artistic conventions, which is a polite way of saying they sing in five part harmonies, and not everybody gets to be the quarterback.
2. On this day in 1606 Guy Fawkes was executed for his role in this plot, whose stated goal was the overthrow of British Parliament and the assassination of King James.
3. In our continuing coverage of the Robot Apocalypse, it was revealed this past week in the journal Nature that this past October a computer program beat a human in an un-handicapped, full-size match against a professional player of what Chinese strategy board game? It’s not Monopoly.
4. What was the name of the first movie to break two billion dollars in the box office?
5. Ham the Astrochimp was a real animal-person who lived from July 1956 to January 1983. We know him as the first chimpanzee to do what?

 
ANSWERS
Funniest team name
 
2.2 SUPER SECRET BONUS ROUND

1. What is the common name for the theoretical transfer of matter or energy from one point to another without traversing the physical space between them?
2. Which dinosaur’s name, translated, means “Tyrant Lizard?”
3. Who was the star of the 1974 movie Death Wish?
4. The name of this mythological figure means, in Hebrew, Adversary, and in Arabic, Astray, Distant, and a third thing that I can’t tell you because it gives away the answer.
5. This 1955 science fiction horror novel concerns the quiet takeover of Earth by perfect alien duplicates of human beings, who kill people and replace them while they sleep.
6. BONUS THEME IS? (4 points)

 
ANSWERS
SCORES
BONUS
 
3.1

1. What is the name of the company that manufactures Scotch Tape?
2. What is the name of the 1971 media event sponsored by the organization Vietnam Veterans Against the War that was intended to publicize war crimes and atrocities by the US armed forces and their allies in the Vietnam war?......This media event shares its name with the supervillain name of Captain America’s good friend Bucky Barnes.
3. Who did Jackie Robinson play ball for? Correct answers get three points apiece.
4. What two coins have been produced every year since the creation of the US Mint in 1794? You hint is that the Canadian Beaver Nickel is not produced by the US Mint.
5. j What is the name of Frank Millers acclaimed, loosely episodic comic series featuring a stark visual palate and not a lot of happy endings?

 
ANSWERS
 
3.2

1. How many cubes are there in a Rubix Cube?
2. In a conventional deck of cards, which is the only king without a mustache?
3. This TeeVee show, which aired from January 31 1949 to February 25…1949, is widely credited as the first ever daytime soap opera. Your hint is that if the dates are any indication it wasn’t very good.
4. According to Forbes Magazine, what are the three most valuable brands in the world right now?
5. Name the presidents who appear on the following bills: $1, $2, $5, $50, $1000, $100,000